Brian was the perfect teammate.  We were team parents and out numbered 3-2.  But he was a strong enough player to hold a level playing field.  When bases were loaded, he was the catcher and tagged our children before they could score a run.  His commitment to our team made us strong and we did the best that we could to hold them on base during the teenage years.  But their team was stacked.  Three heavy hitters ready to stand up to the championship team…  Wow!  What an amazing game we all played together.  And I had an outstanding coach.

            But one day, one of their player’s was injured and could no longer play the game.  It was a sad day, the day we realized that we were one team and that one of our star players would not be there to help bring our team back to victory!  We suffered a few bases, but even though we did, we still came out winners….

Krystalyn married the man of her dreams.  She brought 2 new players to the game, Joel and Zoey.  3 runs there.  Sean has gotten sober and is in school to be an oral assistant.  Score 3 more.  I have moved on to be G-Ma and the proudest parent I can be… I scored 3.  Brian fell in love, remarried and shared our family victories.  4 more runs.

            What an awesome team.  We are sad that Brian was injured and cannot play anymore. We will miss our coach. .  But, we are happy he and Jay are together now in the bleachers and keeping score.  We are still winning…. 13-0.

In her head she kisses Mickey Rourke
to the sounds of jazz lounge
or electronica, imagining the City

sky-lit skyscrapers
hoarding robotic lives
only she & Mickey are alive

only they are worth it
their joy-ride of lust
holds them in it's grip

but only the wind forgives
the stars that hide
the love soon to be torn apart

When you’re older, you can make your own choices
So many choices you wish you didn’t have to make

Like choosing between dinner or gas in your car
The toy for your child or a pair of shoes without holes
Between a stiff drink or delving the unimaginable depths of your loneliness

As a kid they sell you the fiction
Adulthood means freedom
Freedom of choice
They never tell you it’s mostly picking the lesser of constant bad situations
You get to vote
Which criminal is the lesser of two evils?

Choose:
-Between getting proper medical care or paying the rent
-Between taking the time to get better or going to work sick to pay for the medicine
-A quick ****** or real love
As modern adults
We are slaves to our choices

So many choices you get to make when you’re older
Can the car repairs wait? My health? My sanity?
Which coffin do you pick out for your dad?
When do you pick out your own?

I can’t lie to my son
When you’re older you don’t get to make your own choices
They make you


Inspired by Dan Rourke

~INFINITE
Drugs guns attempts and ****** one roll off this urban griots tongue, I'm a sun from the slums that chased redrum funds, I walked the dark path of prison and gore, stopped at the end, then walked back to the beginning to become a verbal detour pointing man women and children in the right direction before the feel the heat and go through spontaneous combustion. The lemniscate ink spiller swings his pen back and forth to counter decapitation scythe swings courtesy of the reaper. I'm a five star general from New York, I was fantasizing on owning islands like rourke, I know the life well chefed ye for color coordinated residuals, ya know that **** that'll make ya lean or have a bobby b jaw with dilated pupils. in order to educate I have to spit with no filter, the life i lived was similar to helter skelter, it wasn't war for race it was war for boy or the contents of a Pyrex being burnt to a gooey paste. I got more friends dead than alive, so i use phonics mixed with Ebonics verse to explain the pain of sending kites to men bidding forever or the pain of following a hearse to release doves and throw flowers over the casket of eternal resting brothers. Money came in...so did those nine elevens saying another life came to an end. The facade doesn't show the downs of the game, you see the foreign wips, the chics, hear about all the chips, high grain ammo and xtra clips, you don't see mothers crying holding daily news clips explaining how her son died because of chips chics and foreign wips, they don't see the cheddar spent on retainers to prevent predict felons from becoming three time losers, The streets don't come with a fine print, it leaves out the particulars.

Infinite the poet 2014

~THE REB
Behind the madness I came to a conclusion of the humen world. The streets caged me in bars with no ability to pull comfort of a drink together with equality in communication with society. Understanding the diversity of life in corners made me believe struting my fist was the way of life. There were no hands to hold onto tomorrow. No space in alleys to run but to dead end vortex duplicity. Uniform authority confined my freedom to be humen. An animal to sociaty but I did no crime. Just to get from one ave to the blv these popo's be trippen down my ****** lines to the creases over my thieghs. Feeling for a high by touch to get that high in a remote area of their private sources. Age nine I stood in the ghettos near home. What I thought was a dream of doom I wome to a high with tracks down my arms proving this confusion. Colors to claim, and colors to flag, I kept pushing away congregations of street wars and bet on my own revolutionary independence. Pistol on my inner thigh I tred lightly in a walk of shame. I found no glory till one day my tears fell on paper. On the walls of East Chapmen Ave California were monumental master pieces of anger and sadness from one end on the wall to the other... I felt something twitch in me... Inspiration of something unfamiliarly bright over the darkness. And for each time I enter back home to family, there was rebirth, and I could not conceive knowledge until one day, the madness got me. I took that pen, and wrote the illustrations of my lack of pigment on every line.. These demons left me in wilderness. No caution about what life had ahead for me. I knew nothing beyond these streets. I lost the innocence in my adolescnce. All the agony and weakness and fears I had hidden for so long, later became exuberant effect. If there was no God, if he didn't love me.. my existence wouldn't have been standing here today to speak behind the madness.

(INCREDIBLE INK- TEAM JAGUAR HAWAII)
© S.T. Rebel of Eden

The Dems duked it out last week.
The Democratic debate number three.
At the current time we have
Quite a political potpourri.

Cory Booker had his moments
Of passionate insight, charm, and wit.
Although his polling numbers are down,
Booker showed that he's got grit.

Klobuchar's our Minnesotan.
While sometimes others appear misguided,
She reminds us all what happens
To any house that is divided.

Warren has her plan for this
And her plan for that, which is fine.
Can she keep up the fight and maintain
The strength to toe the party line?

Harris displayed pluck and resolve.
When she speaks, she's on fire.
It's just curious as to why
Her polling numbers are not higher.

One surprise was Beto O'Rourke.
Beto fans have to rejoice:
This prospective candidate
Has all of a sudden found his voice.

Without a doubt, one of the best
Speakers standing there on the stage
Was our veteran Mayor Pete,
Extremely wise for someone his age.

Although Biden is high in the polling,
At times his answers seem disjointed.
I start with high expectations,
But end up feeling disappointed.

Castro went after Joe Biden.
But sadly Castro's condemnation
Appeared to come less from strength
And more out of desperation.

Yang has managed to keep afloat.
But what's this crazy idea he has
About wanting to buy your vote?
A little political razzmatazz?

Bernie, well…Bernie's Bernie.
But why does he have to be so gruff?
After his rants, one wants to say,
"Enough already, Bernie, enough!"

It's early still and hard to know
Who will advance and who will flop.
But I would vote for ANYONE
Over the current man at the top!

-by Bob B (9-15-19)

I
Cannot die
Hard as I try
Seemingly
I must
Go
On
And on
Beyond this bright stage
To another age
And
Another.
Hilarious
But
No
Ones
Laughing
Perhaps
Its
time

Grahame Rourke

The daffodil hangs its weary head
The trumpet sounded
The winter dead
The tears of snow now shed
The rise of sap
Begins to lap
On the shores of hope
And beyond
So far beyond
Into silence
And stillness
God bless
The sweet caress
Of tenderness
In a wilderness
If not a desert
Of loneliness
Dunes  piled high
By the winds of chance
And the carrot of romance
A seasonal dance
Promises,
And in short, longs
For contact
Ever present
In the back of the mind
Be kind
Please be kind
Its kinder nice
And much better to have
Than cold shoulders
Like boulders
Standing resisting movement
And in their stubbornness
They thwart life
Oh what a die to die for.

Grahame Rourke

Assembled by Ryan P. Kinney
From works by Russ Vidrick, Dan Rourke, Joe Roarty, Tanya Pilumeli, Terry Provost, Brian Matheny, Joe Roarty, Bob Wilson
Additional content from Saga of the Swamp Thing vol. 1
Additional original content by Ryan P. Kinney

The devil checked in at noon
And asked us
What is the sleep of reason?
The devil is a wicked man and wears a suit and tie.

In the eyes of your maker
You should be ashamed
To look your Maker in the eyes

Yes, you must stand naked. We all must

I see the perverts.
I see them on the corner.
I see them in the dark.
There's nothing a pervert won't do for pleasure.
They want to be weird.
That's how they do it.

Taste the salt on your tongue.
Salt of the earth
The ****** that made you and touches everything you made
Give us our daily lust. In **** we trust

...And God teaches the cricket how to play his music.
In a world gone wrong, won't you hear my song...
Live in vain or live in shame.
A dead man's hand, a mad man's brain...living off the lighting in his veins
What a wealthy country, but no one’s coming to pay my bail.